Wednesday, 5 November 2008

Big Beardy Ray, Forgotten Reservations and Swanky Night Buses

After 2.5 years of waiting to return to South America, we are finally back! We have both realised that whenever we remembered South America, we were thinking of Bolivia and so Peruvian civilisation has come as something of a shock. Globalisation is in full swing in Lima, the capital of Peru where we flew in to, with a Starbucks or TGI Friday on every other corner, and so thankgoodness we have made a swift move from Lima to the mountains in the north of Peru. Here´s our little journey so far...

I won´t bore you with ALL the details of our 26 hour journey from Heathrow to Houston, but here´s a few high- and lowlights: Highlights include front row seat on plane to Houston with chicken and mash for breakfast (totally underrated), jaegermeister shots at Papadeux´s bar in Houston airport with our new found texan friend - big burly Ray; Papdeux´s seafood gumbo - didn´t know what it was but if its good enough for Forest gump...
Low lights include broken seats that didn´t recline on flight to Lima, no room for hand luggage in overhead compartment so wedged in all around us, a forgotten reservation in Lima so no where to stay at 2:00am after the longest journey in the world. Character building. And we´re still talking to each other!

After a day in the polluted city of Lima which largely comprised lying on the sofa of our hotel watching MTV (the ultimate in cultural exploration) we got on the swankiest night bus I have ever seen. It had a door man in a full length coat (missing top hat though), complimentary food service, fully reclining seats with leg rests... and wait for it... we were gently woken in the morning by the sound of bird song and pan pipes. Which were great for the first 30 seconds...

So here we are in Huaraz in the north of Peru, a ´mecca for international climbers´such as ourselves (???) and it is stunning. Surrounded by the Cordillera blanca, we have clear blue skies today, and so are planning a day walk to some lakes tomorrow to acclimatise, before hopefully embarking on a four day treck after that. Matt is struggling with a touch of man flu, so hopefully he will stop being a pansy soon and then we can get into these beautiful mountains! :o)

Lots of love to all,

Sarah & Matt

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